


Für Elise

by DeimosExMachina



Category: Starfighter (Comic)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-26
Updated: 2014-11-26
Packaged: 2018-02-27 02:29:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2675573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeimosExMachina/pseuds/DeimosExMachina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A short and late birthday fic for Eli. Not all too happy, I'm afraid. Sorry. Happy Birthday!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Für Elise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



 

Aleks used to be a quiet child. He rarely ever spoke and didn't fight back, when the other boys from the orphanage picked on him. They soon dismissed him as an easy target and mostly left him alone. To them, he was too boring even to deserve as much as their attention.

But Aleks didn't care. He preferred it that way.

He preferred the silence. 

On rainy afternoons the kids were sometimes forced to stay inside. Crammed together in the confined space of the boy's floor, the noise and clamour often would become too much for Aleks to bear. Those were the days he'd sneak up to the attic of the old, run-down building. Sitting cross-legged on the dusty floorboards, surrounded by discarded furniture and boxes and crates stuffed full with old, moth-eaten clothes, he'd close his eyes and listen to the steady drum of the rain against the roof.

He'd remain perfectly still, until his head and his limbs would feel dull and heavy. Leaden. Only then would his mind allow him to wander and take him to another attic altogether. One that wasn't cold and draughty but cosy and warm. The scent of his father's slow-cooked stew lingering in the air, the scratchiness of their worn grey carpeting underneath Aleks' bare feet.

And if he was patient enough, he'd sometimes even hear the old piano tune his mother taught him to play.

His fingers would start to move on their own account. Tapping along with the melody that was imprinted on his mind.

Muscle memory.

It had been years since he'd last seen any musical instrument, let alone a piano. Not ever since the poison-gas-accident in the factory near their house that got both his parents killed, and left him an orphan with vocal chords damaged beyond repair. But sometimes he could still feel the cool of the ivory keys underneath his fingertips.

Much later, when he is no longer the boy Aleks but the Fighter Deimos, and his ship is hit by enemy fire, he will remember the simple old tune. He'll close his eyes, and his Navigator's cries of fear and pain will fade away. He'll feel safe and warm once more, spiralling wildly through the cold, unforgiving vastness of space.


End file.
